 My name is Kim Bant, I'm the Artistic Director of Props Nation Theatre and it's our pleasure and our pride to be able to present this event. It's one of my favorites. Now it is our second annual wide-open poetry slam here during poem city and I know you're all really nervous about getting you know getting up here and doing your thing so I want to prolong your agony. What I'm really basically here to do is introduce the representative of the Kellogg Public Library, just the organization of course that makes this poem city event happen. This explosion of poetry here in Central Vermont every spring now and so I'd like to bring out John Pullio, a member of the trustees of the Kellogg Public Library. Thanks for coming to this poem city event as Kim said my name is John Pullio, I'm the representative from Middlesex, a Kellogg-Covered Board of Trustees representative here to welcome you. Thanks for coming to this event sponsored by the Lost Nation Theatre and we'd like to thank Kim and Kathleen for having us and this wonderful venue which was the place for the kickoff event, the keynote, about a month ago. It's been a month of poems in the city and we started here and we're coming to a close and we have this great anything-go-slam here tonight. A wonderful venue and a wonderful collaboration between Lost Nation Theatre and the Kellogg-Covered Library. Poem city presented by the Kellogg-Covered Library since ninth year. If you didn't know that we're moving ahead next year's our tenth so let's give it up for the Kellogg-Covered Library. This doesn't happen on the cheap here. The sponsors for this year's event, the National Life Group Foundation, the Vermont Humanities Council, the Hunger Mountain Co-op, the Poetry Society of Vermont and the Vermont College of Fine Arts. So tonight's MC and I had to look that up. If you look up our hosts and MC in Wikipedia the interpretations vary. It's either Mr. Master or mischievous confabulator, Jeff Hewitt. Since you're being a writer and a poet, a teacher and a trainer, Mr. Hewitt, and let's bring the hammer, is the Wham Bam. Ain't from Alabama. Ain't no scammer. Guy gives a dammer. Looks great in pajamas. He's the slammer jammer, slam poet of Vermont. Let's give it up for Jeff Hewitt. Well it's such a great pleasure to be here and we're so grateful to the Kellogg-Covered Library and Lost Nation Theatre and all the sponsors that John just mentioned for making this possible. But more than that the people who actually are going to provide us a show that we don't know what's going to happen. It's going to be one surprise after another. Give it up for the courageous slammer tonight. I'd like to have you also give a warm welcome to tonight's recording angel, a complete volunteer, Mr. Kim Bent. Now Kim, your job is not only recording angel, but you are fact-checker. So if any of the scores that I announce seem completely off, you will say point of order. You got that? I got it. And other than that you will write names where there are dots there. Not a lot of space and you have to leave in just enough space for a number to follow the name. I have numbers through 1 through 25 and Ellen, 25 dots here, they're pretty close. Ellen, I need a number between 1 and 25 please. What did she say? She said 13 and that will be Sarah K, S-A-R-A-H with a K. Stay where you are Sarah. There's no rush. What you need to do is come up with a number now that hasn't been called. 10, a good one. Bruce, have you been paying attention? 7, did you say? 7, yes. He said 7. Mila, where are you Mila? Yes, there you are. M-E-E-L. Oh, I'm sorry, M-E-A-L-A. 9, good call. Kim Ward, 14, she's paying attention. Hunter, she gives me what's called a late sign-up, but all it says on it is poetry slam. I look on the other side. Oh, Izzy. Izzy, why? Izzy, where are you? I need a number. Did you say 11? B-L-I-T-H-E. Where are you Blythe? 3. 3, James W, James Wazzle. Where are you, James? Yes. How about 9? James, you haven't been paying attention. 24. 24, good call finally. Sarah, G, Sarah with an H. Where are you Sarah? 21. Boy, that's great, good call. Russell. Yes, 2. Nice, you've been paying attention too. Hannah with an H on both ends. Say that. Yes, Noel, where are you Noel? With Kaya. Alright, Noel and Kaya, you're gonna be together on stage, is that right? Kim, you are so good. Look, you all believe how beautiful the handwriting is. 17. 17, Rick. Yeah, my fault. K-A-Y-N. Yeah. 22? He's got it right. Now, I'm not sure. I've got Aaron and Sam. How do you spell Aaron? Is it two A's and then R-O-N? Did I get that right? A-A-R-O and Sam. You're fishing for a number, aren't you? Did you say five? Yeah. Wow, good work. George. Oh, George has been writing down the numbers. He's been to slams before. One. One, good call. Tom, our man, where he is. Do you like Tom or Thomas? T-H-O-M-A-S. Yeah. Did he say 20? Yeah. He's got it. Lenin. Oh, Lenin is L-E-N-N-O-N. You'll take any. Let's hear it for Lenin. He'll take any. He took a Jim V. Yeah. 23. 23. Oh, Jim. D-I-Y-A. Did you say 18? Good one. Another Kim, a Kim, B. Yeah. Did you say six? Yeah. Jennifer, T-J-E-N-N-I-F-E-R with a T first less named Jennifer. Where are you? Yeah. Did you just say 12? 17. Just you said seven. Yeah, that's Lisa S, L-I-S-A. Where are you, Lisa Sheridan? Yeah. Did you say 24? Yeah. No, that's Chris P, Chris Pat, and that is H-A-L-T-Y, halty mograph. Did I get that right, halty? Halty? You see that? H-A-L-T-Y. I don't know. Maybe that's me. Haley? Is it Haley? H-A-L-E-Y. Yes. She was already called. Yeah. Oh, we've already got her? Yeah, but I think we'll set that. Is there anybody who is performing tonight whose name has not been called? Yes, indeed, and you are the one number that wasn't called Newton Baker, number 15. Oh, you are so right. And John Foster. John Foster? Yes. You're going to close the show, John. Not at all, when they know what you're going to do. And now, ladies and gentlemen, the extraordinary introducing of the judges. Judges, when your name is called, please rise and come to the stage. That was just to build the tension, because first I want to read to you the rules of SLAM. Performers can do anything they want for five minutes with the 10 second grace period. That is, if you go five minutes and 10 seconds, you're still okay, but if you go five minutes and 11 seconds, you've crossed into the dark world. And for every 10 seconds thereafter or portion thereof, a half a point will be deducted from your total score. The judges. Did somebody wisecrack me? You know how sensitive I am to that. Five judges will score the performances in a range of zero to 10 using decimal points to one place. The decimal point extraordinarily important. So judges take note of that because otherwise we have so many ties, and we only have one prize. Many ties, one prize. The highest and the lowest of those five scores discarded. The highest score from each judge possibly being a 10. And the highest and the lowest of those five judges scores discarded. I have a question for you. What is the highest score a SLAMmer can get? You already know the answer Noel. All right, I'm going to call on Russell. 23. Be close. I take some comfort in that. Yes. 30. Yes. 30 is the highest. Now back to you, Russell, because you have got such good reasoning here. Oh yes. Pretty extraordinary question. It's existential and I don't have an answer. But he's got it right. You need four 10s in order to get a 30. It's a wacky world here. And throughout the evening we will remember that the points are not the point even though he's got such fabulous judges about to be introduced. The point is the performance. Now please welcome our judges who will one by one come up on the stage. First we have Steve to be a judge. And Steve replied, and I quote directly, nothing except your request. And the quote question. She said quote, um, what? Well, I never trained a person in my entire life, but I really like the thought. Two years ago at a SLAM, you gave me an overview. That's when I had my first experience. That's Patricia. We got Tonya. She says quote, um, I'm very judgemental and fast and she writes bad poetry. You don't have the right attitude. Well, I'm left handed and I was thinking hard. Thank you very much. You keep them in line for me. Will you please start over? Hi. You said it. Do you hear by affirm? Do you hear by affirm? That I shall remain objective throughout the SLAM. That I shall remain objective throughout the SLAM. Not giving unnecessarily high scores. Not giving unnecessarily high scores. To my sweethearts. To my sweethearts. Or those who are worse will become my sweethearts. Or giving nasty and low scores. Or giving nasty and low scores. To those for whom I hold this day. I further promise that I will use both scorecards. From zero to point zero. Which means don't quit your day job. All the way up to ten. Which means your performance blew my socks all the way to Toledo. Your performance blew my socks all the way to Toledo. Finally, I promise to return the scorecards. Which have been lovingly photocopied. From the Bible of SLAM. From the Bible of SLAM. You decide to SLAM poetry then. Poetry. SLAM for sale. It is up to you to approve or disprove the awarding of scorecards to these judges. Shall we award the scorecard? Folks, every SLAM begins with a sacrificial performer. That person who offers his or her talents with no hope of walking home with a fabulous prize. That person who, well, just gives of his or her talents so the judges can learn how to work their way through the scorecards. That person tonight, your sacrificial performer, I've agreed to do it. Premature scoring is discouraged. They say the daughter at birth has all the eggs she'll ever produce. The path is set at your mother's birth as other paths unfold like a lifeline in the gradual, almost imperceptible unfolding fist of time. Some of these paths will come to coincidence. It might be the accident of a flat tire that delays you just enough to miss the train that would have run you over. And driving home with your suitcase, you stop at a bar to inspect the tire, then decide to have one. And you meet a brilliant executive who takes you into her confidence. And within a year, you're flying in a private jet, riding in limousines with faultless tires and tuxedo drivers who know the quickest route and where to drop you to celebrate time saved by such smart travel. At times you think you're controlling the path. How else would anyone be so lucky if not just playing brilliant, maybe even a brilliant executive? But you crave time. So you can climb into the tuxedo and take yourself for a spin in the limousine, ignoring the snooty stairs at stop lights from people in normal cars who think you're just a lowly chauffeur sporting about in the boss's rig. Driving home at midnight, your headlights catch the eyes of a cat working the roadside. It canicks and runs a path diagonal under your left front tire. At midnight, there's no finding an owner, no one to comfort and thus make yourself feel better. The teary master in a night shirt telling you between sobs it was only a cat. You slump from the vehicle and feel your way. You know the path can swing in front of fortune and misery or zag between the two a whole life long. That's why I keep my fingers crossed. It's a four. Of course, it isn't too hard to make a ten. I want to point that out. Just use the one and the zero on the cat knot until I call for them please. Mr. Jump the gun. One, two, three. Let me see him. I've got a 3.9 from the... Start over, a 7.3. Audience, your job is to influence the judges. I said a 7.3, a 7.4, a 7.5. Say a nice. From what I've tasted of desire I hold with those who favor fire. But if it had to perish twice, I think I'd know enough of hate to say that for destruction this is also great and would suffice. So that's where this world is heading according to me. And this poem proposes and pulls in its solution. It's called Beyond Fire and Ice, Melting Frost. I once looked to force of power to save me at the final hour. The justice of the mighty sword I prayed would have the final word, then write, and might could finally sound a shot. This loss was heard all around. Recently, it's empathy that strikes me as the greater power to save us from our deadly hour. The willing heart that paves the do's of walking in the other shoes. The wish to see how two fine starts could walk their travelers far and hard through snowy woods when paths diverge and two contrasting ends emerge. They face off now, these ends. Bitter rivals, left, right, liberal, conserving, gay, straight, cisqueer, not rich, poor, low, high, nor south, east, west, which one of us decides which one of these is most deserving. Maybe you are Muslim, Christian, Hindu, Jew, the exceptional U.S. or Syria or Korea informing all the rest. Our flag flies the highest. Our religion is the rightest. My verbal diarrhea straight from the shitter. I tweeted proud on Twitter. My crap is the best. Lone wolves, pack wolves, brains with chemical imbalances versus the normal amount of life challenges. Should we nuke them or rebuke them? Give them chemical weapons or chemical lobotomies. And is this the best we can do with our carnal dichotomies? My world came in first. Your world came in third. The Olympic games of human worth. Gold tops, bronze. Is this how we let our treasured cornucopia be measured? So to most lives matter, some lives matter only a few, only me or mine. Some 1% or 99 that I or my community have self-defined. You can't get there from here, says the little pony. Stop called by me in the dark of night in the middle of the road. There are endless reasons why human beings, climate-wide, don't see eye to eye. And any less than all of us fails not just you or me, but the entire humanity that were called to be. To meet again, both good. In a forest seen for whole, despite the blinding blizzard and the separate routes illumine by solitary souls exacts a higher price than final days of biting words or deeds of fire and ice. So do you believe? Do you believe? Do you believe? Do do do do do do do. Do you believe? in your dignity more than in an enemy. And when you shine, will you shine your power? And yes, you have it. So when you shine your power, whether tender as a snowflake or towering above and light both paths, in listening and love, yeah, yeah, yeah, this is the Pony Island. Nothing less warm will suffice. Yeah, it's important to, if you're going to use the microphone, really speak directly into the microphone as much as possible. But she was heard. Yeah. Yeah, OK. But you've got to get right on top of it, unless you're going to yell the way I do. Judges on account of three. No. She's going to be a leaf bird. One, two, let me see him. I got a 5.9, a 6.4, a 6.7, a 7.5, and a 8.2. I'm going to do a song called When I'm Gone, so I guess I'll have to do it while I'm here. And I won't breathe the praise there, and I can't even won't be asked to do my share when I'm gone. So I guess I'll have to do it while I'm here. And I won't be running from the rain while I'm gone. And I can't even suffer from the pain when I'm gone. Can't say who's to praise and who's to blame when I'm gone. So I guess I'll have to do it while I'm here. Won't see the golden of the sun when I'm gone. Can't be singing louder than the gun. So I guess I'll have to do it while I'm gone. All my days won't be dances of delight when I'm gone. And the sands will be shifting from my side when I'm gone. Can't add my name into the fight or what I'm wrong. So I guess I'll have to do it. I guess I'll have to do it. I guess I'll have to do it while I'm here. I saw I never heard it before. What's that instrument you're playing? That's a guitar. A what? A guitar. With a G? Yes. Woo. It looks like a mandal. OK. Oh, yeah, it's a guitar. Judges on a count of three. One, two, three. Want to see them? I got a, oh, man. This is an alcohol-free event, but you may have some booze for this score. I'll say it again. Alcohol-free, you may have some booze. He was found by the Bureau of Statistics to be one whom, against there was no official complaint. And all the reports on his conduct agree that in the modern sense of old-fashioned work, he was a saint. For in everything he did, he served the greater community, except for the war until the day he retired. He worked in a factory and never got fired. But satisfied his employers at Fudge Motors, Inc. that he wasn't a scap or odd in his views, for his union reports that he paid his dues, our report on the union shows it was sound. And our social psychology workers found that he was popular with his mates and liked to drink. The press are convinced that he bought a paper every day, and his reactions to advertisements were normal in every way. Policies taken out in his name prove that he was fully insured, and his health card shows he was once in the hospital but left it cured. Both producers' research in high-grade living declare he is fully sensible to the advantages of an installment plan, and had everything necessary to the modern man, a phonograph, a radio, a car, a frigid air. Our researchers into public opinion are content that he held the proper opinions for the time of the year. When there was peace, he was for peace. When there was war, he went. He married and added five children to the population, which our union says was the right number for a parent of his generation. And our teachers report that he never interfered with their education. Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd. Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard. The next poem is called Nothing Gold Can Stay. Nature's first green is gold, her heart is hue to hold. Her early leaf's a flower, but only so an hour. Then leaf subsides to leaf, and Eden sank to grief. So dawn goes down to day, nothing gold can stay. First poem I will cite is called Number. My mother's phone number is burned in my mind. I know it forwards, backwards, from front and behind, but I have it written down in case I lose my mind. Paradise. A beautiful shore with flowers and trees, the salty smell floating across the breeze, the ocean of blue and green pale purple sea foam washing against the crabs and rocks, exotic birds soaring through the bright pink sky, fish leaping out of the warm water to get a glimpse of our land-lover life. Last poem is called Bracelet. The bracelet I'm wearing is quite patriotic, but that does not mean I agree with our current presidential situation. This bracelet belonged to my cousin, Starr, that I only saw two years ago in the land of leprechauns and green grass Ireland. She asked me to mind it, and I never got to return it to her. So maybe sometime in a while, I'll give it back, but until that day when I see her again, I'll do what she said and mind it for a minute. Judges, on the count of three, on the count of three, please. Mother rush the gun. On the count of three, judges. One, two, three, I wanna see them. Ooh, I've got a 6.1, a 6.4, a 7.5, a 7.6, and a 9. I know, they're sitting here now. This is your 10 minute call? They tell me I cannot speak of it, must not speak of it. They told me from the start I had no voice, should not speak, could not fathom it. From a young age, they told me I had no right to, no need to, no idea of, I had no experience, knew nothing about, never came close to feeling what it was like to have color, to have technicolor full blown racial history. From a young age I learned that it was black and white, not black. I was green with envy maybe, from conquerors envy, not red, but I was yellow, only in the street lights, haze, brown, only when I lay in the sun and tried to pull that specialness from the too hot summer day. They told me that my ancestors had taken all the colors and thrown them out, thrown them away, smashed them until the only color that remained was blood and it was all a burden I had to carry in silence, in shame, inside my gut, my lungs, the lump of my throat, the righteous anger I felt and red saw her and didn't want people to be done this way, done wrong, treated like nothing but a handful of cheap color crayons melting in the dashboard of life in a large empty Walmart parking lot. That wrong was not for me to say. That's terrible, but it's a consequence of my own existence. That's too bad, but it's my fault. My grandfather's red-handed vengeance, my great-grandmother's he-jewed-me-spewing fault. Even though the Irish woman in my hip bones stepped over the murdered bodies of siblings to get to America, even though my poor-is-dirt grandfather stripped of his homeland and made to walk in chains, worked the belly of the pinta, slapping maggots from his skin and sneaking out on deck to drink the cold stars at night to get to the shores of Massachusetts and climbed high into the rocky green mountains with one mule and a muelish wife to plant a few grains that died that first winter in Vermont and left them starving until the late, late spring. Even though the Scottish weaver under the skin of my thigh ran screaming from the British army as they brutally raped his wife and burned his fields. No matter how I sliced it, diced it, moved it, shaped it, tried to make it stand on its own two feet on the small dias before me, I was still white. White as the sheet pulled over the head with two holes for eyes. White as the crosses before they burned on the green, green lawns. White as any drum head of skin stretched over the marching drum's frame. White as the flash of the bomb over Hiroshima, over Nagasaki, over the splayed, hot, dry, putrefying Japanese internment camps built right here on US soil to house decent American citizens whose eyes were not the right shape. White as the out of touch, out of reach dock at the Florida port of call for the SS St. Louis. White as the snow on the trail of internment camps, sorry, on the trail of tears as all the bones torn limb from limb of white hot lead at the battle of wounded knee. As white as the sheets on the beds and the pages and the books and the prayer beads and the crucifixions in the assimilation boarding schools that pocked the Native American landscape. White as the line on the inner skate a mother stumbles over on the border while she is lifting her child up, up, over the fence into freedom. I tell you here today that I am alive, that I bleed, I choke. I am at times ashamed, shoved, shoved down, over shoved into, away from, into and that I speak to you from my ribs, from my belly, from my crotch, from my ever dwindling, never used uterus, from the very poison that was injected into the deep marrow of my bones to say no more. I speak to you always as a woman. Always as a woman garnered with the pearl white of privilege, told her body is not enough, not the right shape, size, strength, not for anything but sale. I speak to you from the gaping mob that is colonialism, wrapped in democracy, wrapped in commerce, wrapped in the big business, eating the little guy, eating the ever dwindling, smaller girl capitalism and I am fed up, overfed, underpaid, undervalued, under stimulated. No, overstimulated. Wait, it depends on the day and the office and the amount of fear for the nickel the big man throws my way and on whether I have caught the dime up in my bare toes and whether I have plugged in, unplugged, settled down in an easy chair before the digital god and anesthetist or on the hard ground before the hardest goddess of all, the goddess who rules all the days and nights and hours, minutes, seconds to come during which I can choose to be part of the many armed monster or to take the knife in my teeth, climb the monsters back and slice and slice and slice away until then I can send it out over the cliffs of times with a shove of my two small white feet, send it out into the air trailing stars and fire and molten hot anger for that larger than light bug in the room, racism. That which must be exercised, irradiated, chemotherapy out of existence once and for all so that my nieces, my nephews, your children, your family will never have to step through this goose-stepping dance again. Point one, but a seven point nine comes up, a nine point zero because I'm gonna count backwards. So, be alert. Three, two, one, a six point zero. Oh good, no disagreements between the fact-checker and the expert. You know, people are always saying to me, Jeff, you're such a good-looking god. I heard that. Your body is like a Greek god and your writing is so extraordinary. It's as if Shakespeare reincarnated. How can it be that you do all that and you're such a genius at numbers too? I may come up, but he keeps me honest. I wanna hear about- Silly poems and serious poems just for poetry slams. And guess who that got me? Stuck in the dumps of the poetry slams. But you know what, today's discussion is about crime and secession. You can raise your hands. Okay, I know it's a random question, but you'll see why I asked it soon. Now, I want the Vermonters in the room to say Vermont when I get to three, okay? One, two, three. Vermont. This time, this time later, okay? One, two, three. Do I have an accent? Sure, some of you probably do, like Jersey, New York, Massachusetts, Ireland. But have you ever considered that Vermonters also have an accent? Trust me, I'm from Utah. I know I can hear it in your voice. Y'all don't say your T's. You make this sound that kinda replaces the T, and you say it at the beginning of the words, but not in the middle or end. For example, my friends are always like, oh, I'm G, he sent you a heart emoji. See, it's like Vermont. It drives me nuts. You know, did that? Y'all need to work on your T's. And you know what? This also drives me crazy. I hear people say, oh, I'm G, Vermont's mountains are so pretty. First of all, again, with the friggin' T's. And secondly, you ain't got no mountains. I'm from Utah. I've seen and con real mountains. Yet, I'm still another issue for another time. Well, anyway, let's review today's lesson. Firstly, work on your friggin' T's. Secondly, your mountains are literally big hills. And thirdly, what's the big deal about kale? The fact checker wants to disqualify her. That is native Vermonters in the room. I know we got a lot of true native Vermonters down here, but that's old folks. Some of us come from New Jersey. You were born in Utah, but you have grown up in Vermont. On account of three judges, one, two, three, I want to see them. I've got, ooh, a 1.0, a 7.1, a 7.5, a 7.9, and it looks like a, that's what I call it. A perfect 10. A total of 22 points. There is a time-honored tradition in Vermont at SLAM, so that when the first 10 of the evening is awarded, that I perform a musical tribute to my performer. So I'm going to perform now a musical tribute for Izzy. No, that's not it. That's preparation. My mother has eyes on the back of her head. I don't quite believe it, but that's what she said. She explained to me she'd be uniquely in doubt to catch me when I did things, not allowed. I think she must also have eyes on her rear. I've noticed her hindsight's unusually clear. That's what you're gonna do. My next one is If I Were a Dog by Richard Shelton. It's one of my favorite poems, and yeah, okay. I would trot down this road sniffing on one side and then the other, peeing a little here and there, whenever I felt the urge. Having a good time with the hell, saving some because it's a long road, but since I'm not a dog, I walk straight down the road. Trying to get home before dark. If I were a dog and had a master who beat me, I would run away and go hungry and sniff around until I found a master who loved me. I could tell by his smile and I would lick his face so he knew. Or maybe it would be a woman. I would retract her. We could go everywhere together, even down this dark road, and I wouldn't run from side to side sniffing. I would always be protecting her, and would only stop to pee only once in a while. Sometimes in the afternoon, we could go to the park and she would throw a stick. I would bring it back to her each time. I'd put the stick at her feet and I would say, this is my heart. And she would say, I will make it fly, but you must bring it back to me. I would always bring it back to her and to no other if I were a dog. Okay, my last one is about, it's an original last minute poem. And it was composed when my dad and I were at dinner and he squirted my eye with a lemon. Yeah, and he calls himself my father. Okay. And it's called the lemon poem. Beware, the treacherous lemon, it squirts. Tears roll from squinting eyes, a direct hit. The water wanted that juice. I'd glare at my fingers, traitors. Yeah. Judges, I'm gonna go in numerical order this time so you won't be confused. One, two, three, wanna see him? Look at him. Ooh, a 6.8, a 6.9, a 7.5, a 7.6, and a 7.7. Those of us who wanted to, and we wrote a Renga, which is a social form of poetry. So I'm gonna open with one of the poems we wrote. And I think out of the five authors who contributed, I think four are in the room. So this is an untitled Renga from poem city. The earth is flat, okay? It's true, NASA admitted it. I know this for a fact. It spins more like a pizza, wobbling on God's great hand. I love the mist and the baked crust possibility of endless finely chopped snacks. If you see the world complete, redolent with garlic and grain, you will know the answer to life, the universe, everything. Is olive oil. This poem is called Benjamin and I wrote it for my brother. Benjamin. If I had to choose between you and a talking octopus, I would choose you. And together. Can't hear, you gotta speak into the mic. Thank you. Benjamin. If I had to choose between you and a talking octopus, I would choose you. And together we would protect the octopus from well-intentioned but ultimately destructive scientists who would want to know how lacking vocal cords, the octopus, forms words. He would tell us stories of the beauty and isolation in the dark, vast sea and he would weep cold tears of loneliness for his childhood when no bigger than a grave he drank in the delights of discovering new worlds. His three hearts pulsed, thrilled by adventure through ocean currents and caves. The eels could never catch him. They tried every day with their snapping teeth but he was so fast and his ink was so black. As he talked, he would wrap his tentacles around our fingers and arms and he would squeeze to tell us something. Even a talking octopus can't find the words to say. On the count of three judges, one, two, three. Let me see him. I got a 6.8, a 7.7 and 8.0, a 7.3 and a 9.3. I love it. Sad G. Yeah, I rhythm off. Okay, so the first one's about a refugee and it's called being lost. Stumbling, taking her first step into a new light but a dark one, full of hate and unforgiveness. The leader, cruel, abandoned in this new world, she must fight. In this country, fighting America, this poem's called Strangers. Strangers, standing in line, barely touching what they hold dear. First fleeing, now suspects, who did nothing yet are called criminals, taking nothing, not your job, not your money, but you take everything. All they have left is the will to live. My mass poem's called Civil War and it's about the Civil War in Syria. Civil War, they choked, fighting to grasp the one thing they thought they had, oxygen pulling from their lungs, being replaced, the lungs scorched, hurting like fire, destruction at its finest, standing in a civil war. Got a 3, 1, 2, 3, I wanna see him. I got a 7.2, a 7.9 and 8.3 and a 9. Russell. So I was pleased to see that all of the judges were adults and you will see why in a second. The protester to this fad has actually been going around talking about video games. Bad video game manifesto. Bing, beep, they wrought people's minds. They're video games, the worst kind there are. Fortnay, what to do? If they are, they might stuff someone into a drawer. I've tried to pound that message in. I hope they teach it to their message on and over. These games are one of the endlessly mar. Bing, beep, they wrought people's minds. They're video games, the worst kind there are. 17, yes to the night away to an electronic beat, spun on our heels and floated away on a melody. Teenage bodies soar like the wind when he came for 17 of their bodies emptied his magazine into their swirling vortex like the branches of the ancient maple deep in the forest felt their aged stone crumble. They have been here before we have been here before. Our bodies jangling in the pockets of those who should protect us bleached bone trading cards scattered on legislative floors and maybe even about this perverse dance on this floor taking care not to soak my shoes in their collecting their scattered teeth a roadmap to know where we are going. Nowhere in the road to hell is not paved with good intentions, but with the bones of 20 children who died within pastel walls clinging to construction paper and magic markers. I don't know what words I can use when babies and bullets threaded together didn't move you. Slowpoke seven. Their appearance or their skin color and but they're treated all the same. Perfect world, girls are treated the same way boys are and not inferior. In my perfect world, it doesn't matter what religion you practice, everybody treats you just how they would treat anyone opposite gender view or the same gender. You are congratulated for finding love. In my perfect world, you believe you are and not always the gender you were born in. In my perfect world represents hate or violence. My perfect world represents everything I believe in. But this world can be just like my perfect world. All we have to do is try. Yeah. That sort of stuff. So I don't remember the name of the poem and I just remember the poem. I'm pretty sure it's weather the weather. I don't remember. And I don't remember who was buying it, so. Whether the weather be cold, whether the weather be hot, whether the weather, whatever the weather, whether we like it or. Yeah, can I start over? Yeah, sounds. Don't sell the steam. I don't think so. I remember the poem, so, so, so. Whether the weather be cold, whether the weather be hot, whether the weather, whatever the weather, whether we like it or not. There we go. Yeah. Anything to do with either of our poems, by the way? So it's just something that we wanted to do and I talked her into it. Yeah, and then you decided to quit and I talked you back into it. The proofs, the figures were ranged in columns before me. When I was shown the charts and the diagrams to add, divide, and measure them, when I sitting, heard the astronomer, where he lectured with much applause in the lecture room, how soon, unaccountable, I became tired and sick till rising and gliding out. I wandered off by myself in the mystical moist night air and from time to time, looked up in perfect silence at the stars. So that was a piece by Walt Whitman and if you'd like to hear it again, come see Silent Sky around behind the corner here, behind the curtain at Lost Nation this weekend and next. It's at the end of it and it's surrounded by a lot of other beautiful language with some other beautiful performers and next is a, I call it a melodic lyric poem. Other people call it a song and if you want to hear this again with some accompaniment by a jazz pianist, Tom Cleary, who actually made the writing for accordion. Come see it at Quarry Works this September in Hannamans and it's called Great Full. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. My life's great, my life's full and I'm grateful, seems unfaded to be sated with a whole plate full. God has slated things to be weighted in my favor so I'll savor every flavor I'll never waver and either be hateful. When I rise, open my eyes, I'm always thankful. I won't pass life as a gas, it's a whole tank full. As I travel down this road of life I will hit no speed bumps and won't jack knife or because it's like a deposit, it's a big bank full. Some can cope at the end of their rope but I never waffle. To lose hope, I'd be a dope to do something awful. I'm too thoughtful to act unlawful or any such blather. I much rather take a hot lather and eat a full waffle. If you're down wearing a frown, take my advice. Boom, boom, boom, boom. Don a gown and head on downtown until you feel nice. Boom, boom, boom, boom. Stick your chin out, keep that grin out and it's more than sure that you'll win out over the worst you see any adversity. I'll say it twice, make yourself pretty, then hit the city, try to be witty, sing this here, diddy, that nitty gritty, that seems so shitty, you'll find. Was there feists? Boom, boom, boom. Sorry for that bad word. Well, with this, the word dick-a-may means showing. But other than that, you're just gonna hear numbers. You know those, the name's dick-a-may. Woo, they are good judges, aren't they? A 7.1, a 7.7, a 7.9, an 8 point. As a young adult came to me right after word and me said, playing the preface this, I began writing this as a song 25 years ago when I was a mere 35 and the woman, and I started it as a song, so that's how I'm gonna start it here. I was feeling lonely on a cellular level that was biologically extreme. If I didn't feel some skin on my skin pretty soon, I'd have to scream. She walks out of the night dressed in cotton candy, looking like hot butter scotch and ice cream. Lickable lips, but they taste like maraschino cherries. She's a confectioner's wet wet dream. On the tip of my tongue, Lord, she's too young for me. Oh, Lord, she's so young. She was walking slowly with a lot of extraneous motion, a little forward, but mostly side to side. I was collateral damage by a series of explosions that would detonate with every stride. I groat for some perciflageness ammunition that would cause her to pause and meet my eye. I hoped that she might finally clumsily charming, but the moment passed and so did she right on by. To some young, studly manifestation looked like something made by ancient Greeks. Sure, he looks like a god, but is anybody home when he speaks? Is there anybody home when he speaks? I decided to leave then in a quest for entertainment. I had pockets full of perdeamide and paid. I decided to leave then in a quest for entertainment. I had pockets full of perdeamide and paid. I was full of vinegar. It was gonna be a late night. Pretty certain I wouldn't get much sleep. There was a song in my head, seemingly random, I couldn't place it. It was so old that I couldn't recall. Hours went by before my brain was able to trace it. Maybe not so random. After all, oh holy. The girl from Ipanema who couldn't see the older guy. Me? So, the night went by, but slowly, wrestling with more cow like he. I was wrestling my more cow. I was feeling lonely. Ooh, a 5.0. You're talking to yourself, who has almost tasted pretty fluttering songs, quick, darning, chattering for a tantalizing motion. Got a big, feeder fat grave with their trophy-clued tails. I mean too much for consolation, you understand. Dreaming here on the bed by the window, opening one eye to the apple tree, cocking an ear to cardinals and chickadees across the street, knowing, wishing, I could. I cry now and then for the open door, for the young, lean days, for desire of the sweet, long ago hunt. I know you understand. I've heard you cry, too. Once you get up, you can eat breakfast, you can open that door, and we can go out hunting our dreams. Oh my god, ooh. I got a 7.5. Another 7.5, double boo, and 8.4. Backside of the track, we were near the home stretch, and I clung to his back. I heard the announcer say that we were way out front, and all of a sudden my horse took over and pulled an unexpected stunt. He gelt off the track, out through the cow barn gate, to the place where I was about to beat my unexpected fate. He took a four hoof skid to the place of my swift wedding, and I went sailing over his head into a pile of fermenting bedding. I climbed back on and down the stretch we flew, and joined the rest of the pack before the race was through. In spite of the fact I did not win, I was thankful for the place that I was in. The Grand Sands gave us great support and affection. They could see that we were really tried, but just lost direction. When a kid does not win in Caledonia, people do not turn their backs and disown you. The chill on the hill. I remember the hurricane of 1938. Dad was not home, and it was getting late. I was worried about my father, and I did not know what to do, but now I led the way to see it through. The winter heard something, that winter I heard something from pitless wharf brain that millions of times worse, that were million times worse in the hurricane. I heard dad tell my about news I was not supposed to hear. Mankind had gone haywire, and this filled me with fear. I could not ask my mother to see me through, because my eavesdropping was not the thing to do. The next morning I went out to pound the snow, but the festering fear would not go. We lived on a farm up on Old Vales Hill. This is a place where dad kept his till. Most of his clients had no money to pay, so he was given farm animals corn and hay. Clayton, the hired man, came to solve my plight. He noticed I looked down after that terrible night. He said, George, what's the matter with you? I told him about Hitler, and he had figured out what to do. Don't worry about Hitler. We'll shovel him on the pile. I get the message and I begin to smile. My fears were put to rest and replaced with fight. This gave me the strength to fall asleep at night. But still sometimes I do not sleep that well. I realized that too much fight we could all cease to dwell. I realized how much love the people of Montpigas can include. Until I drove through town on my way down to feel the cornfields and food. In spite of the fact that my response towards a life really correct, the motorists all around me just smiled and nodded with respect. The congeniality kept gushing till I got to my appointed chore. And then I pulled the lever and outblasted the manure. In the condition that it's in, we waltzed. It's almost a sin. Judges on the count of three would. I got a 6.3. A 6.6. A 7.4. A 7.5. And a 9. Which is actually a microphone pack. Practicing over in the museum and really today, I should preface, I work here on the master electrician, house manager, resident light designer, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. We all do lots of things. But I was practicing earlier this afternoon over in the museum room and I rehearsed a different song I was going to do today. And I just, something hit me and I finally finished the song I've been working on a month. So I'm going to debut this brand new song. You can hear it in all of my other songs at Sweet Melissa's on Thursday, May 10th at 6 p.m. Appreciate it. Actually this is way too close. It was kind of slid in here. So they do. But nothing happens. They are very strict. They are very confused. So, but they have a better idea. They make the cut bigger. Nothing happens. Bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger. Nothing happens. So they cut and cut and cut and cut. Until there was no more waterbell. A bunch of lines from Shakespeare put together to one line. It's called Plucking Time of Night when the hurly burly's beneath me thinks I see thou. Thou art below. So I'm going to do it in Spanish and then I'm going to go backwards. Wait a minute. Well, I got to wait a minute too, so don't worry. Tenes. Dos. Uno. Dig on it. I got it all over the house. A 6.5. A 6.8. A 6.7. So I take advantage of any opportunity. So when Jeff said it was anything goes, he said covers are okay if I admit it. So I'm admitting a cover. You probably have heard it. So you could probably help me sing it, right? So kids, if you don't know how it goes, it just goes like, it peeks out of the misty gray clouds and pours into my room. It warms me up from head to toe and makes the flowers bloom. It makes me feel happy, safe, filled with joy. It's incredible, really, that one thing, one piece in life, can make everything so peaceful, so in sync and so happy. Sunlight. Light, Denali wild, against gray, curves, shout, Ken is ever more mild by the neck. Flight of birds in northern sky. Crows remember faces. What the heck? Cry. Cry. Beta cry. Life stories in film and true. Thomas Jay was stung by the bees and he could not stay with you. The whales are filling with plastic. Green mornings on Kentucky homesteads make you forget all about it. The wolves on the craggy peaks were wailing to their moon. Denali would be leaving soon. Denali, wild and free. Is she you? Is she me? Denali as a young girl who ran through the raspberry brambles. Tearing, so tearing at her. Out through those gravel pits and through that ice-cold river. No fair. Can you see her? Water washed. Those cherry riblets away. Denali, deep. Denali's deep, deep strength would always stay. The wolves wailing at the moon. Denali would be leaving soon. My, my wild and me, my Denali climbs those art peaks, hauled around by the neck as a young girl pain seeks. Denali won't vendor break. Compassion leaks. Time, time, beat, beat. Miles to go before I weep. Denali breathing. Dusty rose trail and vine. Why do you come to me so fine? Johnny copper acorns with news void caps. Beat of rain on canvas tent. Tath rap, tath rap. Clarity bell ringing out over the valleys of Evermore. Falcon in searing cry. Soar, no poor. Glistening broken aggots on lake superior shores. Shetland ponies racing over the locks in the moors. Keening that Gaelic word for wailing. Why am I so drawn to that word? Life past pain trailing. Miles to go before I weep. Count to three in English forward. One, two, three. I want to see all of them. I got a 6.6. 6.7, a 7.5, a 7.6, and an 8. So there's that. My marching band is that I can now successfully move soup from one counter to the other without any of it spilling. But I appreciate that I now have this skill to see me through my life and beyond my magical ability to balance soup. Thank you for reminding me to always take a pencil with me because you never know why you're going why or how or when you're going to need to write something important down. Dear honor band, thank you for bringing me around the world without me having to leave my seat in the auditorium. That's the thing about music, right? You can experience different cultures through the story, a crash course into different lives, a glimpse past the small world I was living in. Dear jazz band, you do know people who play the flute exist, right? Like we're not magical fairies like we exist, we're here. Dear middle school band, thank you for catching me when I fell. At that time in my life, the only stable thing in my day was my hour in the auditorium. You probably saved me more times than I can remember. Thanks for giving me a home when I needed one the most. Dear middle school band, I teach now. I used to be in your place. I remember sitting where you are and being just as scared. It's going to be all right if you make it all right. Stop making excuses and start doing. You will fail, but you will only be better because of it. And I know I'm only four years older than you, but please stop hitting each other with sticks. It's really, it's distracting. Dear concert band, sweet, sweet concert band, you hold a special place in my heart. Thank you for bringing me my best friend. We met five years ago over a rivalry over who would get first chair. And now I have first chair. But I only made it there because of him. Thank you concert band for teaching me the importance of hard work. Without you, I would not be standing here today. I found my best friend. I found my lifeline. I found my calling. I found my salvation. A little bit more serious. Lessons learned from inside a hospital waiting room. A list. One, the vending machine only takes single dollar bills, and it's really inconvenient. Two, the coffee here is only for adults, and they will yell at you if you try to take some from the complimentary desk. Three, the adults don't know that you've been here for 30 hours and you're really tired. Four, sometimes the adults are just angry at you because they're worried about someone that they love. Five, love can be weird like that. Six, people do weird things when they're sad. Seven, goodbye was harder to say than you thought it could be. Eight, the coffee here tastes gross. Maybe the adults were right. This is on account of three. One, two, three, showing the money. I got a 7.9, an 8.1, a 9.0, another 9.0, and a 9.5. People hate. My tears slip into my hands. My mom helps, I love her. My dad comforts me while I cry. I love everyone. Sing Puff the Magic Dragon, it's one of my favorite back home songs. And I asked you not to be turned off by the title to the words of this. Can you hear me? How's this? Okay. I'm gonna sing this as best I can. Jesus, thy blood. Writing activity. And at 6.45, the anything go slam begins. That's this Friday of the 27th. On account of three for Lisa, one, two, three, I want to see them. Holy. I got a 6.2, a 6.5, a 7.0, another 7.0, and a 7.0. It's about religion. My clothesline. After the clean machine and the arm and hammer has baptized your socks, blue jeans, T-shirts, dresses and panties, freed them of soil and sin in brutal cycles of tumble and spin, your socially acceptable, imported and carefully chosen second skin are ready to be hung out to dry on the clothesline. You and yours are the entire congregation of this shameless two-dimensional religion where T-shirts, one after the other, are crucified with clothes pins in a Catholic kind of way, where it's a parade of parishioners flapping and snapping in the wind like a black southern Baptist would, or you're a Jack Mormon or a rebel Catholic turning it all in for the exotic, untainted Tibetan Buddhism. Your adopted skin just prayer flags on the wind. The secular humanists saw the last on the line. There's a carbon-based religion by design. With reason it figures, creation salvation hangs on a clothespin that, believe it or not, keeps carbon in the ground. Well-figured, poetic and sound. Whoever you are, you cannot help but put your ragged but sanitized self out there on the line for all to see. Judge, look what I'm into and what I found, a clothesline religion. Judges, Monic, oh, I'm so glad you're coming back. One, two, three, I want to see a move. I got a, ooh, a 6.3. Change greets me from the top of Vermont's out to me. But alas, cherished memories echo in my mind, call back swirling in a two-swift flowing river of time where from moment only memory anchors me in the reality of life some while ago, where once were a barn in silo, a joining fields of fresh mown hay and in the pasture cut chewing Holstein cows, tails switching to chase the flies. White cows with black patches, I used to say. No, black cows, white patches, farmer power smile. The spirit of his crinkled face, long, lean frame and sweat stained shirt whispered to me. Do you remember how we used to mow cows by hand or attach the milk machine to each team? Pills of warm fraught white milk to pour into big milk cans in the dairy, driven next morning to the downtown creamery by farmer powers in his pickup. I'd hitch a ride to the creamery and he'd show me where the milk gets processed, then drop me off at school. I smelled a barn like other kids in class, but nobody said ew. We knew the smell we understood. Do you remember the fresh sweet smell of mown hay, the thin stiff tapes to timothy grass stems, one end bogging from your mouth or turning hay with a pitch for your load, sometimes too heavy to throw upon the wagon, lifted up only to dump back upon your head and you covered laughing on the ground. Dry hay made me sneeze, nose stuffed up, eyes watered red. Hay fever, hay fever, farmer powers said. Do you remember the barn gutter, a place you walk near with care, any time a cow spreads back like to be aware of one steamy splash and punching piercing smells of nostril cleaning cow manure or the sharp tang of corn silage, criteria the silo mixed with a sweet whistful smell from fistfuls of grain we chew dipped by hand from open brand sacks. Do you remember the shoulder ache of post holes dealt with crowbar pole, touching grass to the electric fence to test for shock. Pastry cow flops, woodchuck holes, little field mines, black shadows flitting through the barn, kittens in the yard, wobbly mead, baby calves, tractors, deaders, tongs in the haymout, stanchions and little metal fountain cups you press your nose into to drink if you're a cow. As a kid, I watched down a fresh baked piece of chocolate cake with a tall glass of cold white milk. I swallowed in the thaw, maybe just maybe the cow and I had shared a bit of the same field of hay. These seams silent now are no longer there to find me. Thank God somehow I get hay fever still. Three judges, one, two, three. Want to see them? Zero. First, we have a special announcement from our extraordinary fact checker. Okay, a week from tonight, Wednesday next week at 7.30. We are, please come back and join us. We're going to be presenting a cabaret with Newton Baker and not Newton Baker. Sorry. Whoa, okay. Dan Brumhauer, they're going to be joined by special guest, Rick Ains, who you heard earlier tonight, and Kathleen Keenan. So, next week at 7.30. So many talented people here, and did anybody get nervous when they had to come up here? Get used to it. It never goes away. It takes courage to come up here. I applaud everybody for it. What a great night. Anyway, well, I worked a week trying to write a song. I got it finished last year. I can't put it more. A very big song. Well, I've received a copy of, I said, don't read all the poems because a couple of them have dirty words in them.